The current efforts in student mini companies are unlikely to result in a significant number of start-ups. A much more significant potential are spin-offs, from state-owned companies or clusters such as the Hi-Tech Park where geographic proximity creates the conditions for learning. Additional analysis would be needed to identify what those sub-sectors of the economy would be in each region (e.g. smart specialisation mapping) and active companies to provide targeted support in areas where the region has a competitive advantage.

Defining learning outcomes of entrepreneurship is needed at all levels of education to effectively address entrepreneurship key competence in teaching, learning and assessment processes.

The authorities should define entrepreneurship key competences in teaching materials and learning outcomes to ensure teachers ability to develop their students' entrepreneurship key competences.

Integration of entrepreneurship key competence approach into pre and in-service teacher training is needed to ensure teachers ability to develop their students' entrepreneurial learning key competences.

Establish formal career guidance to provide more targeted and systematic support to students with entrepreneurial aspirations.

There are several policy documents that contain provisions for supporting interaction between the education system and the business sector for the purpose of entrepreneurship training. Belarus should bring entrepreneurial learning under one policy home for all levels of education and training, for example, by building on the existing Council for Entrepreneurship Development.

SME networks and collaboration, both nationally and internationally, need targeted support to facilitate their integration into global value chains which opens up new training and learning pathways, opportunities for technological transfer, skills upgrading, and innovation that would give a much-needed boost to SMEs and encourage them to move from low- to high-valued-added activities.

The new Agency for SME Support offer an opportunity to bring all SME training under one roof. The Agency could monitor the productivity and ability of SMEs to permanently adapt to changing environments and market conditions and provide tailored training programs that target managers and entrepreneurs.

The Ministry of Economy should take the lead in strengthening data collection for evidence-based planning, monitoring and evaluation (e.g. under the new Agency for SME Support). This could also serve as a means to establish a co-ordination mechanism for SME support organisations. Big data tools offer opportunities for real-time labour market analysis of the demand side. Big data could be used to strengthen skills anticipation.

A state-wide system of structured transition training, e.g. apprenticeships and traineeships, combining work and formal education and training, should be developed within the context of the qualifications framework.

The approach could combine broad-based VET in a public or private education and training institution with subsidised work in relevant fields to form an integrated transition system from training to employment. By linking it to the qualifications framework, participants would have the opportunity to progress to more advanced areas of education, training or employment if they wanted to. The approach could be integrated with other employment programmes.

The programme should act as a 'stepping stone' into primary labour market jobs. It should also improve and increase broad-based work-related training and improve the 'life chances' of the participants. The programme should raise the status of many of the jobs involved. The target group must include both employed and unemployed people because many jobs offer essentially unstable employment and few training opportunities.

The introduction of the Baseline Qualifications Framework has the potential to support aspects of industry policy more directly. The framework offers Bosnia and Herzegovina an opportunity to restructure its vocational education system for the benefit of employers and employees by delegating regulation of the system to business and industry.

Although not yet implemented, the planned Baseline Qualifications Framework appears to be based on qualifications derived from occupational standards. While this is a common approach, there is also scope for the qualifications framework to be developed around industry sectors.

Qualifications for skills-related career paths could be identified by industry sectors and be led by employers' organisations and associations. This would provide an economy-wide reference point for the qualifications and create a new role for business and industry in the education and training system.

Discussions should be held in various sectors about the occupations most in demand in order to identify the standards that need to be designed and delivered. The framework could be used to support enterprise restructuring in key industry areas. For example, state-owned enterprises have been identified as a particular problem, affecting macroeconomic performance, fiscal sustainability, labour market outcomes and competitiveness. The qualifications framework, together with the relevant occupational standards, could be used to develop a skills framework for these state-owned enterprises that would help them assess the skills profiles necessary for effective restructuring.

Education authorities and state institutions should increase efforts to implement European initiatives in education and training, e.g. key competences, qualifications frameworks and quality assurance, to strengthen their links with the EU and avoid falling behind internationally. This should involve the development of a new VET strategy to pay particular attention to sectors with high growth potential and wider developments in Bosnia and Herzegovina to adopt smart specialisation strategies.

The current arrangements could be strengthened significantly if the Conference of Education Ministers established indicators that could be related to each of the frameworks and progressively followed by a monitoring secretariat.

A monitoring approach that makes progress more visible would improve the speed of implementation. The work of the Standing Conference of Education Ministers could lead this by developing a new state-wide cooperative partnership agreement on skills development with key targets for the implementation of policies and their alignment with EU developments. A state-wide standing group on VET could track this process.

This would also assist Bosnia and Herzegovina in representing its different systems at an international level, as it is currently difficult for the external systems to engage with, or follow, progress in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Career guidance services need to be expanded to include pupils prior to entering secondary education in order to make them more aware of career opportunities.

The elements of career education that already exist in school curricula should be evaluated in the light of this proposed expansion. It is recommended that these measures are accompanied by a comprehensive career information system (web-based and interactive) that should also target parents.

The pilot career centres set up by Swisscontact should be evaluated, with their further development potentially providing a model for all VET providers.